Ashes 2021-22: Australia Win 4-0 — Travis Head Compton-Miller Medal (357 Runs, Centuries Gabba + Hobart), Scott Boland 6/7 on Debut MCG, First Ashes Test in Hobart

Australia won the 2021-22 Ashes 4-0 (5 Tests; 4 wins, 1 draw). 1st Test Gabba, Brisbane (Dec 8-11, 2021): Australia won 9 wickets — ENG 147 & 297; AUS 425 & 20/1. Head 152 (fastest Ashes century at the Gabba; third-fastest Ashes hundred ever). 2nd Test Adelaide Oval (Dec 16-20, Day-Night, pink ball): Australia won 275 runs — AUS 473/9d & 230/9d; ENG 236 & 192. 3rd Test MCG, Boxing Day (Dec 26-28): Australia won innings and 14 runs — ENG 185 & 68; AUS 267. Scott Boland debut: 6/7 in England's 2nd innings (7 match wickets). Ashes clinched 3-0. 4th Test SCG, Sydney (Jan 5-9): Draw — AUS 416/8d & 265/6d; ENG 294 & 270/9. Warner 95. 5th Test Bellerive Oval, Hobart (Jan 14-16): Australia won 146 runs — AUS 303 & 155; ENG 188 & 124. Head 101 (first Ashes century in Hobart). Travis Head won the Compton-Miller Medal: 357 series runs. Pat Cummins captained Australia (first Ashes, appointed after Tim Paine resigned November 2021); Joe Root captained England.

Scott Boland 6/7 on Debut at MCG: Equalling the Fastest Five-Wicket Haul in Test History

Scott Boland — on Test debut at the MCG Boxing Day Test — taking 6/7 in England's 2nd innings (matching the fastest five-wicket haul in Test history: completed in 19 deliveries) gave the 3rd Test's decisive bowling moment to a player who had not played Test cricket before December 26, 2021: England's 2nd innings 68 (their lowest MCG Test total in generations) built around Boland's 6-wicket burst that included Zak Crawley, Dawid Malan, Joe Root, Ben Stokes, Jonny Bairstow and others among his victims, giving Australia the innings win (by innings and 14 runs; England all out for 68, 14 runs short of Australia's 267 first innings total) that clinched the Ashes at 3-0 with two Tests remaining. Boland becoming only the second Indigenous male Australian — after Jason Gillespie — to play Test cricket for Australia gave the MCG debut its historical significance beyond the 6/7 figures: a player whose performance in his Test debut (Johnny Mullagh Medal, Player of the Match) equalled the fastest five-for in Test history and produced the bowling performance that clinched England's 3rd consecutive Ashes series defeat.

Travis Head 152 at Gabba and 101 at Hobart: Compton-Miller Medal Winner

Travis Head scoring 152 at the Gabba (1st Test) — the fastest Ashes century ever recorded at the Gabba and the third-fastest Ashes hundred in history — and then 101 at Bellerive Oval, Hobart (5th Test; the first Ashes century ever scored in Hobart, a venue making its Ashes debut in the series) gave Head the series-defining batting contribution that his Compton-Miller Medal confirmed: 357 series runs built around two centuries at grounds with historical firsts attached. Head's 152 at the Gabba from 85 balls (Day 1-2 of the 1st Test; Australia's 425 built around it to dismiss England twice for 147 and 297 before Australia won 9 wickets) and his Hobart 101 (5th Test; Australia winning by 146 runs to complete the 4-0 series result after the SCG draw) confirmed the consistency that Head's Compton-Miller Medal reflected: centuries in the 1st and 5th Tests of a 4-0 series, with his Adelaide half-century (not a century — Head scored a fifty in the Day-Night 2nd Test as Australia won by 275 runs) showing his bilateral batting contribution across multiple formats of the Ashes matches.

Hobart's First Ashes Test and Adelaide's Pink Ball: New Venues and Formats

The 2021-22 Ashes series included two venue/format landmarks: the 2nd Test at Adelaide Oval was a Day-Night Test using the pink ball (a format Adelaide had hosted repeatedly since 2015, giving Australia home conditions for day-night Test cricket that their preparation for the pink-ball variant had optimized against England's batting — ENG 236 & 192 against AUS 473/9d & 230/9d, Australia winning 275 runs) and the 5th Test at Bellerive Oval, Hobart (the first Ashes Test ever played in Hobart, a venue that has hosted interstate Sheffield Shield cricket but not previously an Ashes Test) confirmed that Australia's 2021-22 bilateral distributed Tests across venues not all traditionally associated with Ashes cricket: the Gabba (Brisbane), Adelaide (Day-Night), MCG (Boxing Day), SCG (New Year), and Hobart. Head's 101 at Hobart — the first Ashes century in Tasmania's history — gave the 5th Test's batting landmark its historical attachment to the venue's Ashes debut.

Ashes 2021-22 in Context

The 2021-22 Ashes — Australia winning 4-0 (Head's Compton-Miller 357 runs; Boland's 6/7 MCG debut; Adelaide Day-Night Australia win 275 runs; Gabba 9 wickets; Hobart 146 runs; SCG draw) — gave Australia their 4th consecutive home Ashes series win (Australia having not lost a home Ashes since 2010-11) and England their 4th consecutive Ashes series defeat in Australia. Pat Cummins' debut as Ashes captain (a 4-0 win) confirmed his leadership era's start in a series that included Boland's historical debut, Head's bilateral batting, and the first Hobart Ashes Test. England's subsequent Ashes campaign (the 2023 Ashes in England; Bazball under Stokes; drawn 2-2 as Australia retained the Ashes away from home) confirmed the bilateral character change that England's 2022-23 Bazball approach introduced: the 4-0 defeat in 2021-22 becoming the bilateral context that England's 2022 white-ball series dominance and 2023 Ashes drawn result developed against.